Oct. 19, 2011 - Issue #835: Colleen Brown
On the Record
F&M
Fri, Oct 21, Yellowhead Brewery
/ Bjorn Friedrich
Vue Weekly: How long did it take to make Wish You Were Here, from the initial songwriting through to the end of the recording?
Becky Anderson: We wrote the newer songs in Victoria earlier in June. The new arrangements of older material were done during our time touring as a trio—mainly our cross-Canada winter 2010 tour. We wanted the album to reflect our most intimate sound. We recorded off the floor and it didn't take very long—a few days. It was mixed, mastered and manufactured before our tour, which started in August.
VW: When you were writing the songs, did you come at them in a particular way? Lyrics first? Music first?
BA: A lot of my songs are happy accidents. Last year I got a new accordion and slowly I have become more comfortable and inspired by the sound of this instrument. The lead-off song, "Music By The Sea," occurred while staring out the window at the ocean. My hands just started creating the music. I struggled with the lyrics, as nothing felt natural. Later, on the plane home to Edmonton, I was humming the melody and the words came! I grabbed an airline vomit bag and jotted it down. This was a very foreign method of writing for me. Most songs come together with the music and the words fitting into place as I write down my notes for the musical ideas.
Ryan Anderson: I try writing songs using different methods and approaches, it's the area of music I feel most comfortable and at home with. "Old Photographs" started as a single chord that I was tinkering away with. It got me thinking about the process of memory. I'm fascinated by the concept of memories; the way it blurs from personal to collective, factual to completely false. ... For me, memory is blurry, beautiful, dissonant and sometimes just weird.
VW: What were the recording sessions like for this album?
RA: All of our records are recorded at Bryan Reichert's Rhythm Egg Studios. As an engineer he's an amazingly technical and an unreal musical talent. He makes our jobs really easy, a great engineer should do that, we challenge ourselves enough, and the gear shouldn't factor in. We were super physically tired during the process, but that made for more interesting vocals.
BA: Recording was super quick and mainly off the floor with very few takes. As a trio, (Ryan, Rebecca and Bryan), we have learned to really trust each other. There were only minor additions—like the violin by Bryan in the first two songs. Otherwise, everything was done together. Wish You Were Here is an album that was intended to provide the listener with an intimate performance sound; something best enjoyed with a bottle of wine. It's the sound of exhaustion and contentment.
VW: Bryan Reichert is both your engineer and your guitarist, what does he bring to the recording?
RA: He has a lot of input in final orchestration with a great deal of experience in multiple genres. That said, from our practices and touring we were all in agreement of what kind of sound we wanted to capture, how we wanted our vocals to be and what the mix should be like. We all agreed we wanted a romantic, mellow and simple record, something most bands don't seem to be doing. We wanted each sound to really matter.
VW: Were there any other songs written that were left off the album?
RA: No—we knew what we wanted. We do have lots of other songs written and in the works but did not consider these for this recording. I still believe in records. I like the confines and prefer congruent records that seem to flow, and I doubt I'm alone. This album is as it should be.
VW: If you were to trace the musical map that led you to Wish You Were Here, what would it look like?
RW: Weisse Beer, the Smatlan's and Roman spas in Baden-Baden via pinot noir in Victoria with smoked meat in Montréal, add a layover at a Denny's in Kalamazoo and the record is back home exhausted in Edmonton. The songs are the spaces in between.
Fri, Oct 21 (7 pm)
F&M
With Tyler Butler, Orit Shimoni
Yellowhead Brewery, $10 vueweekly.com comments: powered by Disqus
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